Talk:Warwick/@comment-25218650-20170111111817/@comment-25037679-20170113024129
Sure, Titanic Hydra is nice on Warwick. I'm not convinced about the Cleaver, though. A lot of people on here are, for some reason or another, building around optimizing Warwick for when his enemies are below 20%, where he's at the attack speed cap even without any items. They use this reasoning to say you shouldn't build attack speed items on him, which seems pretty ridiculous to me. It's like building Pantheon around when his enemies are below 15% health-who gives a damn? They're gonna die either way if they're that low. Hell, with the Titanic Hydra + Cleaver build, I've done the math. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1eusNcftx_gl8fVuKCE442nOB1cKFvWWqXjWGhMbBwuI/edit?usp=sharing (feel free to make a copy and mess with it yourself to see) You have inferior DPS to even Titanic + Wit's if you assume both Wits and Cleaver are automatically stacked. That is to say, Wit's End pairs better with Titanic Hydra than Cleaver does, giving more dps at 20% to 100% health values on a tanky target, for 600 less gold. (plus letting them both start automatically stacked actually benefits Cleaver in the comparison, since it stacks slower on Warwick than Wit's End.) I'm not saying Wit's End and Titanic Hydra is the best combo on him (it isn't really) but I think it proves a point if it has comparable or higher dps than Black Cleaver. When I compared them I also had both armor and mr values for the target set to start out at 200 before being reduced, which far favors Cleaver's % reduction, and ignores the fact that a lot of the squishy targets you'd want to be focusing would have about 80-100 armor but only 30-50 mr, or that Wit's End would increase his ultimate's damage far more than Cleaver would. Anyway, Wit's End beating or being equivalent to Black Cleaver for less gold might not hold true as long as the target is stacking MR, but then why are you building Cleaver if they aren't stacking armor? Why not get a Trinity Force or a Blade of the Ruined King? Cleaver is just an absolute waste of an item on Warwick is the answer. Don't buy it, unless maybe you're pairing it with even more physical damage onhit items, preferably one with attack speed. Meaning, Trinity, Bloodrazor, or Blade of the Ruined King. Then it might actually be cost effective. For build options at comparable or lower prices to Titanic + Cleaver (6600 gold) that remain superior or as good on a 3000 max health 200 armor and mr target at the vast majority of health percentages, try these: Wit's End + Trinity Force (6233 gold) Wit's End + Black Cleaver (5600 gold) Wit's End + Blade of the Ruined King (5900 gold) Blade of the Ruined King + Black Cleaver (6500 gold) Blade of the Ruined King + Bloodrazor (6025 gold) Blade of the Ruined King + Tiamat (4600 gold) Blade of the Ruined King all by itself (3400 gold) (you could use that extra 3200 gold to buy a Sunfire, DMP, or a Randuins or something and be tankier than Titanic+Cleaver while still dealing similar damage) For a lot of these options you might want to add on a Titanic Hydra on later for waveclear and a bit of extra burst in all ins, but getting these combos first would give you a stronger power spike. This does mean that a variant of the Titanic + Cleaver build, Botrk + Cleaver + Titanic, is a good option potentially, if you really wanted to stress your physical damage. To make it work you need Botrk's very potent onhit along with the 40% attack speed, which is more AS than Warwick gets from levels at level 18, greatly increasing his effectiveness on targets above 20% health. It also complements the fact that Titanic + Cleaver is good at lower target health values, and Botrk can shred current health to get your target to that point faster. Botrk's active could also make use of having the target's armor reduced by Cleaver, or be used to get an extra stack on the way. Bloodrazor could also fill the role Botrk holds in that build however, and investing heavily in attack speed in runes could make up for Titanic + Cleaver's weaknesses. A better option though for only two damage items while trying to be tanky might be Titanic + Trinity. Titanic's active plus Trinity's sheen proc would give you a lot of upfront burst damage in an all in, helping you take down squishy targets, while both still give you health to increase your survivability. This is in contrast to Cleaver, which slowly builds up damage as the fight goes on via shredding armor. Going for Titanic + Trinity burst would also let you deal most of your damage on the first tick of your Ultimate, meaning that even if your channeling gets interrupted you've already dashed in and done most of your damage. The primary downside is that Trinity costs 633 more gold than Cleaver. If they have enough magic damage though, Wit's End will remain the better item for combining damage and tankiness at a low cost, at least for Warwick. In a way it's a decision between whether you want to do better against squishies (Wit's End) or against tanks (Cleaver) for a build that already has Titanic and Botrk, but you definitely don't want to get Cleaver on him as one of your damage items if you don't have other damage besides Titanic to back it up. A build I might suggest, in no particular order, is Botrk, Visage, Gauntlet, Wit's End, Titanic, and whatever boots feel appropriate. Maybe Ionians to reach 40% and lower Ghost cooldown. You'll be fairly tanky but deal plenty of damage. You can sub out Wit's End for Black Cleaver like I mentioned if you're up against a lot of tanks or if your team is heavily AD and you want to reduce armor for them. (3000 health, about 170 armor and mr, slows from Gauntlet's passive and Botrk's active, and roughly 500 dps autos+q after resists) Rageblade and Gunblade might have a place in the build too after they reintoduced the AP ratio on his Q. Wit's End and Titanic would be drawing the short straws, or maybe Spirit Visage if they're heavy ad. Gunblade is probably one of the best damage items available for Warwick's Q just off of stats, ignoring procs like Trinity, so it has an interesting role to play, especially for trying to heal off of all of your onhit damage. The harder part is using Rageblade, though. The main problem with Rageblade is that as you ramp it up and gain stacks, you're probably going to be getting your target down to a very low health percentage before it finishes stacking and you start getting double hits, so the extra attack speed will stop being relevant very quickly. The main place where Rageblade might really come into play is as the basis of a drain tanking build. You'll extend fights much longer the tankier you are, and you'll much more easily hit max stacks and start getting double hits by the time you're low. That means you'll start getting double hits on your passive's healing, which could even mean doubling your triple heal if you're below 25%. Plus, with no other attack speed items, Rageblade's 73% attack speed at max stacks won't be wasted. So, it could be that a build where you just go super tanky with a Rageblade might be viable.